At Home Dining – We Up our Game

The Eating Bar in the Kitchen: every day dishes; cutlery we got as a wedding present (51 years ago); mismatched drinking glasses. In the background on the right – the box with the new kitchen taps act as a reminder that The Car Guy has to either install them or call the plumber…

For most of the last 270 days, our evening meal has been consumed, in our home, at the kitchen island Eating Bar,  by a Party of Two.

What with Lockdowns; Mandates of how big our social bubble can be; living in a rural setting (a bad mosquito season this summer); general caution by others for (and by) people in our age group; the threat of  Fines for non-compliance; and Snitch call lines – well lets just say our social life has been very ‘quiet’.

Christmas Day Dinner was no different and when I asked The Car Guy if he wanted to ‘up our game’ for dinner for two, maybe use the ‘good dishes’ and newer cutlery, he gave me that look that said “We’re having left over ham from Christmas Eve’s Dinner…”

So I imagined left-over ham on the good dishes on place mats and newer cutlery and Canadian Festive napkins – and said “Yeah, it doesn’t make much difference does it…”

The next holiday dinner is today – Boxing Day. At this point in time,  we have eaten left-over ham at two dinners, two breakfasts and two lunches (because a ham of any size is the definition of eternity). Boxing Day we are serving what we affectionately call New Food.

To celebrate, we invited a guest and I set the table in the Dining Room. (How many of you have Dining Rooms? How many times a year do you use that room? We travel through ours many times every day because it is the only way to get to the kitchen from the rest of the house.)

Boxing Day Table set; guest is already here.

The good plates, the good cutlery, the good crystal glasses, a centre piece and Bruce the Moose as our guest. We are all set to ‘Up’ our Dining Game!

(To be honest, this post was inspired by some truly awesome photos of Christmas Dinner posted by friends and family. By virtue of extremely good taste in decorating and/or more people in their family bubble, they had what looked to be a festive and fun Christmas Day.

The reality for many seniors (like us in Alberta and maybe elsewhere) Christmas was somewhat more subdued. Maybe this is because as Covid time passes, it is getting harder and harder to emotionally ‘kick it up a notch’. We are surrounded by a society where government is ruling by keeping people in a blind, perpetual fear.

We are asked to put ‘safety first’ but ignore the inner voice that asks, “what about the collateral damage?” So, we do things as safe as we can, we keep the people near us as safe as we can, but it is a task beyond our ability to make sure everyone else and everything we do is absolutely safe.

Many of us seniors have lived through two pandemics already. Some served in a war or two. We learned to drive before seat belts and air bags. We rode our bikes without helmets. We got chicken pox, measles and mumps. Between 95 to 99.9% of us seniors will chalk up another win in the pandemic column!

So, this year is different, and we can live with that in good humour and good grace. But next year I hope we’ll see a full complement of people at our ‘turkey or ham’ table!

Christmas Tangle 2020 – Carrot Noses and Glitter

My Annual Drawing: Christmas Tangle 2020. Inspiration for this years tangle came from the Golda Rader blog.

This:

What the Snowmen know to be true:
A person is snown by the company they keep.
Boldly go where snowman has gone before.
Dance like snowbody’s watching.
Keep your ice on the prize.
Mother nose best.
Snowman is an island.

That:

I don’t want Christmas season to end, because it’s the only time I can legitimately indulge in my particular addiction: glitter.
– Eloisa James –

The Car Guy is a man of many talents – one of them is wood-working. Recently he has branched out into projects using pieces of wood inlaid with epoxy resin.

In order to keep down the costs of epoxy trial and error, he bought a few small molds to make snowflakes. Then he discovered glitter… We not only have enough glitter snowflakes now for a small avalanche, snowflakes have been slipped into every Christmas card we have sent out. Glitter has been added to epoxy drink coasters too.

I have fond memories of the Glitter phase that our children and grand children went through. They all grew out of it. I expect The Car Guy will too – until next Christmas.

The Other:

I’d like to end this post by wishing you all a Very Merry Christmas and a Happy New Year.

If, like us, your government has decreed that you cancel any  ‘gathering of the clan’, I hope you find a way to make this Christmas a good one anyway.  You might want to consider purchasing some glue and some glitter.

‘Rona Virus – Satan Meets 2020 – Ryan Reynolds

Ryan Reynold’s Maximum Effort (a boutique production house) partnered with the dating site Match.com for ads that depict ‘2020’ as a perfect match for Satan. The two ads are really well done and quite funny.

The ads begin with Satan sitting on his throne in Hell 11 months ago. Unperturbed by the sounds of torture surrounding him, his interest is piqued when a ping on his phone notifies him of a new match.

On a more serious note, this quote seems to capture Covid 2020:

Fear is the dark room where the Devil develops his negatives.
– Gary Busey –

This one captures a significant segment of mass and social media:

I don’t really believe in the Devil, but if the Devil is the Father of Lies, then he certainly invented the Internet.
– Ken MacLeod –

This and That – Robot, Monks, Oops

This

You might be able to relate to this fun video if you have ever had to prove you are not an internet Robot or if you have had to verify your account so that you can change your password.

That

It starts off so plausible and serious…

Did you know that in Las Vegas, NV, there are more Catholic Churches than casinos. Not all that surprisingly, some worshippers at Sunday Mass will put casino chips in the collection baskets.

Since the diocese receives chips from dozens of casinos, it has become problematic and time consuming for individual parishes to separate, count and cash in the hundreds of chips they receive each week.

The Bishop turned to and enlisted the assistance from a Franciscan Monastery, just outside of Las Vegas. Some of the Franciscans sort and count the chips, while others are tasked with delivering the chips to their respective casinos and returning the cash to the parishes.

The latter are affectionately referred to as chip-monks.
– With Thanks to Ray V. at Mitigating Chaos–

The Other

Good idea, really poor execution: The Alberta ‘Rona Virus website has a COVID-19 personal risk severity assessment tool. I tested it out.

Age group: 60-69. Biological sex: Female.
Conditions (from list of 8 health risks): none.
Resulting risk level: LOW
That was what I would expect… except I recently took up residence in a new decade. So I took the test again.
Age group: 70-79. Biological sex: Female.
Conditions (from list of 8 health risks): none.
Resulting risk level: HIGH

To sum it up: If you took this test one day before your 70th birthday, you would be at Low risk. One day after your 70th birthday and you would be at High risk. Seems like they have to have a greater number of age brackets AND they have to give some weight to the health risks.  (In Alberta, the average age of death from Covid-19 is 82. The majority of those who died had 2 or more health risks.)

Some more Close, but not quite right…

When you want to fly direct to Boston but end up wherever your luggage got sent…

Maybe a new way to social distance???

Not the most appropriate photo for this frame…

On Covid-19 Travel Bans and Existential Threats

Regie Hamm observes how, after years of listening to certain people demand open borders and protest if anyone from anywhere was detained or turned away or sent back to their country of origin, for any valid reason – the same people have become movement deniers in the face of the threat of spreading Covid-19.

Covid 19 is allowing all the closeted fear of the open-minded to finally surface… it’s showing us exactly how we will respond in the face of a direct threat. We don’t have to even speculate, anymore. And it’s also showing us which tightly held ideals we will sell out at a moment’s notice, given the right circumstances; the right existential threat.

At the end of all this, those who survive will have an actual accounting of how everyone else acted during it. Who got gripped by fear? Who kept their cool? Who kept their sense of wonder? Who kept their sense of humor? Who helped? Who didn’t?
– Regie Hamm, Existential –

Why Environmental Alarmism Hurts Us All

Michael Shellenberger on his new book Apocalypse Never: Why Environmental Alarmism Hurts Us All

On behalf of environmentalists everywhere, I would like to formally apologize for the climate scare we created over the last 30 years. Climate change is happening. It’s just not the end of the world. It’s not even our most serious environmental problem. I may seem like a strange person to be saying all of this. I have been a climate activist for 20 years and an environmentalist for 30.
But as an energy expert asked by Congress to provide objective expert testimony, and invited by the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) to serve as expert reviewer of its next assessment report, I feel an obligation to apologize for how badly we environmentalists have misled the public.
– Michael Shellenberger, On Behalf Of Environmentalists, I Apologize For The Climate Scare

Andrew Cotter’s Tails from the Labs – Olive and Mabel

More from those world famous labs, Olive and Mabel.

I posted Olive and Mabel Episodes #1 and #2 at Mildly Amusing Missives #9 AND Episodes #3 and #4 at Mirthy Monday Tales from the Labs. You can watch them, of course,  at Andrew Cotter’s YouTube Channel.